The Wakefern Food Corp., founded in 1946 and based in Keasbey in Woodbridge Township, New Jersey (United States), is the largest co-operative group of supermarkets in the United States. The name "Wakefern" is a portmanteau of the founders' names: W for Louis Weiss, A for Sam and Al Aidekman, K for Abe Kesselman, the first E for pronunciation purposes, and FERN for Dave Fern), although the company adopted the name ShopRite for its stores in 1951. Wakefern's current chairman is Joseph Colalillo.
Wakefern owns one of the Northeast's largest trucking fleets and is the fourth-largest cooperative in the United States. In 2012 its revenue was $13.6 billion.
Wakefern also created and operates or franchises the PriceRite limited-assortment chain (based in Wethersfield, Connecticut) of stores in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Rhode Island. (PriceRite is a wholly owned subsidiary of Wakefern.)
Wakefern supplies all of its members' ShopRite stores as well as the PriceRite chain. In July, 2007, the cooperative announced that for the first time, it was offering its wholesale services to third-party supermarket operators, in the Northeastern United States and other areas of the country. Since then, Wakefern has announced deals to supply the Gristedes and Morton Williams chains of supermarkets in the New York City area, Heinen's Fine Foods chain in Ohio, as well as The Market Place in Bermuda
Wakefern also provides its members' stores with services such as: computer services, insurance, advertising, marketing, merchandising, and procurement.
Wakefern currently has a total of seven warehouses in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Wakefern has recently signed a 3-year lease to a warehouse in Carteret, New Jersey. The purpose of the Carteret facility is a temporary facility of grocery products while their facility in Elizabeth, New Jersey is demolished. Wakefern was planning to build a high-tech facility in Carteret.
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